Cord Byrd: “1 year ago this week, the President signed the congressional resolution authorizing him to go to war against Iraq. That…”

“1 year ago this week, the President signed the congressional resolution authorizing him to go to war against Iraq. That signing was a historic moment for the United States. For the first time in our history, the President asked Congress for authority to launch an invasion against a sovereign nation that did not constitute a clear and imminent threat to the safety of the American people. And for the first time in our history, the President demanded that Congress give him unconditional power to initiate war whenever he wanted, limited by nothing but his own judgment. The President wanted war on his own terms, and Congress granted him everything he asked for. For the next 5 months, the President and his top advisors turned a deaf ear to growing concerns about the administration's judgment. When intelligence analysts warned that the White House was acting on questionable conclusions, those analysts were ignored. When Members of Congress dared to ask questions about the President's war plans, they were branded as unpatriotic. When our oldest allies disagreed with the argument that immediate war was the only answer, they were dismissed and called irrelevant. Top administration officials who publicly contradicted the President's rosy predictions were fired, and the American public was kept in the dark about what Iraq would look like after the war. On several occasions, I stood on the floor and asked: After Iraq, what? What shall we expect the morning after the war?”